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BNP set to win election in Bangladesh
00:26:48
Centre-right party on course for a landslide in first vote since former leader toppled
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- [00:00]
A
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- [00:35]
B
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A
This is the global news podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Alex Ritson and in the early hours of Friday 13th February, these are our main stories. The centre right Bangladesh Nationalist Party, or bnp, looks to be on course for a landslide election win. Donald Trump repeals a landmark climate ruling in what critics say is a gift to billionaire polluters. America's CIA spy agency targets potential sources in China's military with a new recruitment video also in this podcast.
- [01:44]
B
Everything is going down slowly in the country and daily life is complicated. I see no future. The only future is a change.
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A
The US blockade on Cuba bites hard for residents of Havana. The Bangladesh Nationalist Party, or bnp, is projected to be heading for a landslide victory in the first election since a student led uprising deposed the authoritarian leader Sheikh Hasina. The Prime Minister in waiting, Tariq Rahman, has been congratulated by the US Embassy in Dhaka and by the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Sheikha Cena's Awami League was banned from taking part and an Islamist party says it has serious questions about the integrity of the election. Our correspondent Azadeh Mashiri is in Dhaka for us. So can we say the BNP has definitely won so far?
- [02:39]
C
That hasn't been officially announced by the election commission, but the BNP has told the BBC that they're confident of forming a new government. The papers are certainly running with it, even if they are unofficial results. One newspaper, the Dhaka Tribune, has a major headline on the front page, BNP wins Absolute Majority. Now that hasn't been declared yet, but people will be waking up here and seeing Cardigan, the leader of the BNP as the next Prime Minister of Bangladesh. And it's a huge reversal in his fortunes because in the last elections, the BNP boycotted those polls altogether. Thousands of their members and their supporters were jailed under Sheikh Ascena's increasingly authoritarian rule. And on top of that, David himself was in self imposed exile for 17 years. So this is a very different morning for him. And yesterday when I spoke to him moments before he cast his own vote, he said he'd been waiting a very long time for this day. The country had been waiting a long time. And he said he was feeling confident. He's going to be feeling a lot more confident this morning.
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A
Yeah. And messages of congratulations already from India and Pakistan.
- [03:52]
C
Yes. And there was a big question over the future of the India, Bangladesh relationship. And that that future depends heavily on who will lead the next government. And the BNP was seen to potentially have an easier relationship with India than Jamati Islami would have had. It's a complicated one because it's very important to people here. These elections wouldn't have happened without the student uprising that overthrew Sheikh Hasina. And when you speak to voters, and I've been traveling in the country for the past few weeks speaking to people, most people still associate India with the Awami League, the party of the former government. And the fact that Sheikh Hasina is in exile in India and that the country has so far refused any extradition requests. She has been sentenced to death here in absentia in the International Crime Tribunal in Dhaka. The fact they haven't responded to those requests means that there's a lot of resentment and a lot of anger here about that. So even though the two countries have had a very good relationship in the past, and that's benefited them in both ways, most people you speak to want to make sure that the future government keeps India's influence in check. And that's a tightrope that Sadiq Rahman will have to walk should he be the next prime minister, which seems very likely right now.
- [05:14]
D
Yeah.
- [05:14]
A
And after Sheikh Hasina's administration, her rule, it is going to take people in Bangladesh some time to trust any government, isn't it?
- [05:22]
C
That's true. And also the bnp, because they do have a, have a history, a reputation, this isn't a new party. They have been around since the 70s. Of course, they did suffer from politically motivated arrests. Independent human rights groups have tracked that, and so they suffered under Sheikh Hasina's rule. But they were in government at one point, two in the early 2000s, and that tenure was marred by allegations of corruption, human rights abuses. And so they were never considered a party of change before. Tariq Ahmad and his fellow candidates have worked very hard to rebrand as a secular liberal party that can bring change to the country now.
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A
Azadeh Mashiri in Dhaka. President Trump has revoked the 2009 endangerment finding on public health that underpins U.S. regulations on greenhouse gas emissions. The White House called the decision the largest act of deregulation in US history and claimed it would end what Mr. Trump has described as the green scam.
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B
We are officially terminating the so called endangerment finding, a disastrous Obama era policy that severely damaged the American auto industry and massively drove up prices for American consumers. Prices went up incredibly for a worse product. This action will eliminate over $1.3 trillion of regulatory cost and help bring car prices tumbling down dramatically.
- [06:59]
A
The former President Barack Obama says this action will leave Americans less safe and less healthy. That is a view shared by many scientists and environmental groups who also accused President Trump of siding with fossil fuel interests against overwhelming scientific evidence. The former US Secretary of State John Kerry served as a climate envoy in the Biden administration.
- [07:23]
B
There's a reason that we had an endangerment rule. The pollution which is creating the crisis of climate is dangerous. It's killer. You know, this decision to just do away with it really takes Orwellian governance to a new height and it invites enormous damage to people and property all around the world.
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A
Our climate correspondent Matt McGrath told Oliver Conway about the significance of the announcement.
- [07:52]
E
The reversal of the endangerment finding, I suppose, can be seen as the boldest step taken by the Trump administration so far in dismantling the apparatus of tackling climate change in the United States. I think you have to see this in the light that the US Congress has been unable to pass any legislation because the political divides on this question have been so great for 20 or 30 years now. So the endangerment finding has become the bedrock of almost all action taken by the United States government, the federal government, to tackle climate change. So it not only deals with directly with emissions from tailpipes and from cars, but it also allowed the government to regulate power plants to stop methane emissions from oil and gas and a whole range of other regulations that they were put in place. So the removal of this, it's not just symbolic. I think it has real world implications and it has, you know, significant implications for US Automakers and for industry. And President Trump is selling it as an ability to cut red tape and reduce costs for the American consumer that will be seen, I think, in the, in the months and years to come. Yeah.
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A
Tell us more about what it means in practice for American businesses and people's health there.
- [09:07]
E
Yes, I think it's going to mean, I think on the car front, no one's quite certain what it will mean because while it will remove all restrictions on carmakers and particularly their necessity to sell large numbers of electric cars, it doesn't necessarily mean that the standards that California applies will be washed away as well. That will still be need to be tested in the courts. And it poses a big question, I think, for carmakers. Are they going to make cars for newly liberated American market where they don't need to make EVs or other cleaner cars, but what about the rest of the world? Will they be able to sell those cars in the rest of the world? So that, I don't think, remains one of the big questions. And I think the other big question is whether states will take legal action to try to overturn this overturning and whether or not we'll see a patchwork of regulations develop across the United States, some in, some out, some against this reversal of this underpinning act on which all the climate action in the United States up to now is really rested.
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A
I guess it could also be reinstated by a future president.
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E
I think there's a move from the Trump administration to ensure that doesn't happen. They want to get into the Supreme Court very quickly. They want the Supreme Court to rule on this before the end of President Trump's term. If they rule in his favor, they believe it'll mean any future president will not be able to overturn this change.
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A
Matt McGraw, can the US and Iran reach a nuclear deal? The head of the UN's nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, is Rafael Grossi, and he says such a deal is possible and urgently needed. He's called on negotiators from Tehran and Washington to seize the moment. President Trump has threatened once again to take military action if the talks fail and has sent warships to the Arabian Gulf. Mr. Grossi spoke to our security correspondent Frank Gardner.
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D
There are certain things that need to happen, of course, understanding, concessions, bit of flexibility, imagination. But it is absolutely possible to envisage a deal.
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A
How is this going to be any Better than the 2015 JCPOA, the Vienna Nuclear deal?
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D
Quite clearly it must, because whatever opinion you may have on the jcpoa, it is very clear that President Trump, he was very unhappy with it. He considered that the agreement had fundamental flaws. So obviously you need a different kind of arrangement. That will get two things. One is credible assurances that whatever happens in Iran with regards to the nuclear program stays in peaceful uses. That's very important. Secondly, that Iran can legitimately claim that they are developing something in this area which is squarely within the parameters of a nuclear activity that is for peaceful uses. So making those points or those lines lines converge is the key to a good deal.
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A
Do you have a view on what could happen if America hits Iran again if this deal doesn't happen?
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D
I think it's very important that the President of the United States is saying that he wants a deal. It has a powerful meaning that he prefers that a second episode of this kind would be much wider and with more consequences. So we want to spare the Iranian population and others who could be affected this possibility. My sense is that we have a window of opportunity, but windows of opportunity have a tendency to shut quite abruptly, so we need to seize the moment.
- [12:39]
A
Iaea chief Rafael Grossi, speaking to Frank Gardner the US Spy agency the CIA has stepped up its efforts to recruit Chinese spies, released a Chinese language video directed at disillusioned personnel working for China's military, known as the pla. It also targets Chinese scientists and other professionals to try to get them to spy for Washington. Beijing has called previous recruitment videos naked provocation with more here's Pete Ross.
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F
The US Intelligence video titled Save the Future, opens with footage of a fictional military officer taking part in what appears to be a kind of intelligence briefing while expressing to the viewer his dissatisfaction with the country's top brass, complaining that the only thing our party leaders are interested in defending is their own pockets. Released on Thursday on YouTube and other social media, the CIA says it hopes the video will strike a chord and encourage actual military personnel and other Chinese citizens to, in the words of CIA Director John Ratcliffe, improve the lives and change their country for the better. The move comes just two weeks after it was revealed that China's President Xi Jinping purged two of the country's most powerful generals following similar moves against high ranking members of the PLA in recent years. And it's not the first time the CIA has released videos hoping to recruit Chinese citizens to Washington's cause. Last year, it posted three videos that collectively racked up almost 100 million views aimed at Chinese Communist Party officials and instructing them on how to contact the agency. It's all part of a CIA attempt to rebuild its spy network in China after it was decimated over a decade ago. Beijing is well aware of Washington's efforts. Last year, China's Ministry of State Security issued a warning on social media to be wary of foreigners bearing smiles and sweet talk as they might be spies.
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A
Pete Ross still to come in this.
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G
Podcast, this woman, she's someone who believes because of her reality that she lives. She believes there is no good man in Afghanistan until she meets this journalist. So There Are Good Men, a romantic.
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A
Comedy set in Afghanistan, has its world premiere. This is the global news podcast. The port of Havana has received some rare cargo. Two ships carrying humanitarian aid sent by Cuba's ally, Mexico. Cuba is struggling with an acute fuel crisis. The Trump administration has imposed a virtual oil blockade on the island by threatening tariffs on any country that supplies it with oil. Cuba lost its biggest energy provider, Venezuela, after its president, Nicolas Madur, was seized by US Troops. And now Washington is threatening Havana. Mexico is reluctant to send oil because of the US Threats, but Thursday's shipment brought powdered milk and beans. Daily life in Cuba is tough. The BBC's Alethea Trujillo has been speaking to a resident of Havana who's asked that we do not disclose his name.
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B
My day to day life have been reduced as the life of everybody else to the survival between cycles of blackouts. That is now the situation. So it is very difficult to do anything else or then perform simple tasks in the house. Trying to do something when the electricity is already connected.
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G
And how long does it last? How long do the blackouts last?
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B
It depends. 10, 12, 14 hours, 16 hours in a row.
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G
How are people just managing on a day to day basis?
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B
Surviving? People try to survive. Depending on the amount of money people have, they try to access to the services or the goods they need to the day to day life. You cannot accumulate too much food, for example, because of the lack of refrigeration capacity in the houses. And even if you have a good refrigerated storage, it depends on the availability of electricity. So food starts to rot, it reduces life to try to obtain the things you need for the day.
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G
Are schools open? How are hospitals functioning? Are those things functioning?
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B
I don't know. They publish some indications coming from the Ministry of Public Health, nor geological maneuvers will be performed, only those for immediate saving of a life.
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G
And I mean, I see tourism isn't coming, so there is no money coming into the country.
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B
Tourism now it is not feasible. Nobody wants to be a tourist in a country in the middle of this situation. Lack of sanitation, serious problem of public health, nothing. You can see that in Havana, the buildings with electricity, those are the hotels. But you don't go to a country to Visit a hotel, you go to a country to visit the country. Social situation is deteriorating rapidly. Also you have now situation of different nature, of violence in the night. You cannot walk in the street because they are all black.
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G
What kind of future are people thinking there is? Because this seems like a long term situation. No oil. And the Americans seem to be putting a lot of pressure on the Cuban government.
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B
Everything is going down slowly in the country and the daily life is complicated. I see no future. The only future is a change. There is no other exit. Situation cannot continue like this. Cannot continue like this.
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A
A resident of Havana speaking to the BBC. The co owner of Manchester United football club, Jim Ratcliffe has apologized that his choice of language had caused offense after he suggested the UK had been colonized by immigrants. In a TV interview, the billionaire criticized what he had described as the huge level of immigrants coming in and gave incorrect population numbers. The British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer described the claims as offensive and wrong and had called on him to apologize. Our correspondent Rob Watson has been following the story.
- [19:27]
H
The background to this is Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who is an interesting character in Britain. He was a big backer of Brexit. He's the co owner of Manchester United, of course, now living in a sort of tax exile in Monaco. But he's essentially sort of exploded this bomb by making these remarks about immigration. And the original remarks claiming that Britain had been colonized by immigrants had brought a sort of massive backlash from some of the supporters of Man United, as you explain, from some British politicians. I mean, he hasn't apologized as such for interfering in the debate. All he said is that he was sorry that if the kind of language he used offended people. But as you would imagine, it's opened up this huge question, not that it's one that ever goes away, Charlotte, about immigration and social cohesion in this country.
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C
Because immigration is something that voters, many voters are concerned about in the uk but it seems that a lot of politicians and public figures really struggled to talk about it in a measured way.
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H
That is true. I mean, the Prime Minister got into trouble when he was talking about this danger of being a country of strangers and he withdrew those remarks in May of last year. I mean, you have politicians from reform, the sort of center right party, a bit less reluctant to do so. But I think it's certainly true that the polling suggests that this is a massively important issue for, for voters. It's the second most important issue behind the economy. And I've really been struck by a recent survey that suggests 84% of people in this country feel that the country is divided, 86% feel there is tension between immigrants and people born here. And then the last bit of the survey for King's College that struck me was 50% of people think UK culture is changing too fast. So I think the public are concerned about this issue massively and some might say reasonably, given the figures involved. But the sort of politicians are struggling, as it were, to get the right tone. That somehow means that there can be a debate that everybody can join in.
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A
Rob Watson speaking to Charlotte Gallagher. The Trump administration has declared an end to the surge of ICE immigration officers to Minnesota. Senior border official Tom Homan said a significant reduction in the number of agents had already begun and would finish next week. State officials and protesters have called for ICE to leave Minneapolis after more than 3,000 armed officers were deployed there last month and two American citizens, Renee Goode and Alex Pretty, were killed by federal agents. Here's our North America correspondent, Neda Torfik.
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I
Many will see this announcement as the Trump administration trying to save face. The president's border czar, Tom Homan, declared victory in Minnesota despite the outrage caused when armed mass immigration agents killed two U.S. citizens there. The incident sparked angry protests and widespread condemnation at home and abroad. Mr. Homan was sent in afterwards to calm the situation as calls ramped up for the secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, to resign. She led the surge of thousands of ICE officers whose aggressive tactics were filmed by local residents. Mr. Homan claimed he had secured unprecedented coordination with local law enforcement agencies and vowed to carry on the president's immigration promises.
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B
For those that say we are backing down from immigration enforcement or the promise of mass deportations, you are simply wrong. Look at the data, record number of arrests and deportations under President Trump's first year and we'll continue that effort.
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I
However, Minnesota's Democratic governor, Tim Walz, said no concession had been made to ice. He called the surge of federal officers an unconstitutional assault on the state that had severely damaged its economy and people sense of safety. Governor Walz said no one in Minnesota disagreed with targeted immigration enforcement, but that people were entitled to due process and to be treated humanely.
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A
Neda Torfik the Berlin Film Festival has got underway with an unusual world premiere, a romantic comedy set in an Afghan newsroom. It's called no Good Men and the main character, a woman, is convinced there are no good men in Afghanistan. The writer, director and star is Shah Banu Sadat, and she's been speaking to James Menendez.
- [23:57]
G
When I had the idea I Thought it's a brilliant idea. But when we started to do the financing, I realized that a lot of funders, they are completely against this because they cannot imagine that a rom com is going to happen in Afghanistan, you know, because there are all these many international films about Afghanistan that they are kind of misrepresenting Afghanistan. And they always tell the Afghan stories through war drama. So I thought, I don't want to tell war drama, because as a person living in Afghanistan at the time, I was interested to tell an insider perspective. And as an insider, you don't live a sad life 24 7. There are also a lot of humor and comedy going on in your everyday life. I wanted to capture the real everyday life of an Afghan.
- [24:41]
A
So was it hard work getting the funding you needed to make it?
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G
Well, you tell me. It took six years, right? Yeah, it was really difficult. It was really difficult because. And not only the financing it, but also logistic wise, it was very difficult because even though at the time when I was living in Afghanistan, I was working with this European company that they didn't want to take risk for European crew. So shooting in Afghanistan was not an option. And then politically, the situation of Afghanistan changed. I was evacuated to Germany. And then it was again, one more time, the big question. We had to shoot the film. Then I was looking like locking all locations in Jordan and then in Greece. And so we just, you know, take the challenge and shoot the film in Germany.
- [25:24]
A
And it has been shot and it's been made, and it's at the Berlin Film Festival. So just give us a summary of how the romance in the film works, how the comedy works. It's all set in a newsroom, isn't it?
- [25:36]
G
Yeah, it's happening in the newsroom. And because this protagonist, she's a camera woman and the male leading role, he's a journalist and they work together. And this woman, she's someone who believes because of her reality, because of the reality that she lives, she believes there is no good man in Afghanistan until she meets this journalist. And little by little, you know, they fall in love. So there are good men. If I'm 100% honest with you, I have all the reason to believe that there are no good men in Afghanistan because of my reality, but also because it's not only my opinion, it's the fact. It's like a collective experience of so many women living in such deeply patriarchal society like Afghanistan, you know, and unfortunately, this is not only the story of Afghanistan. Patriarchy is the universal problem. I'm just telling the Afghan version of.
- [26:25]
A
It, you know, and obviously no chance that the film will be seen in Afghanistan. I mean, I guess perhaps bootlegged versions maybe.
- [26:32]
G
No, I actually think the opposite. I actually think that they ask an audience, they're going to watch the film earlier than people in Europe gonna watch it in the cinema.
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A
How though?
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G
Because I tell you, because in Afghanistan we don't have a cinema industry and but, but it' technology time and everyone are, you know, having a smartphone, they're connecting to Internet and for some reason for, I mean, don't ask me how because I don't know. But they are like stealing the film and suddenly your film is end up in YouTube or they chop the film and they gonna watch it in tick.
- [27:03]
A
Tock, you know, Writer, director and star of no Good Men, Shahbanu Sadat. And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can email us@globalpodcastbc.co.uk. you can also find us on X@BBC World Service. Use the hashtag globalnewspod. And don't forget our sister podcast, the Global Story, which goes in depth and beyond the headlines on one big story, available wherever you get your podcasts. This edition of the Global News Podcast was mixed by Derek Clark. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Alex Ritz. And until next time, goodbye.